Coheed and Cambria

Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV, Vol. 1: From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness

by Scott Hudson

Don't know much about Coheed and Cambria?

First of all, everything they do is not only big, it's bigger than big. Big-Big. The music is mammoth, the production is gigantic, the concept is huge; even the title of their latest 15-track release, Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV, Vol. 1: From Fear Through The Eyes Of Madness, is, for want of a better word, big.
But Before you confuse Coheed and Cambria with other famous duos like Lennon/McCartney, Leiber and Stoller, Hall & Oates or even Loggins and Messina, the band’s name actually has nothing whatsoever to do with its members. Formally known as Shabutie, this New York-based progressive rock outfit (consisting of guitarist/vocalist Claudio Sanchez, guitarist Travis Stever, bassist Michael Todd, and drummer Josh Eppard) changed their name to Coheed and Cambria as a reference to the two main characters of the band’s five-part, five-album post-apocalyptic story concept. The cleverly conceived futuristic, sci-fi saga is the brainchild of Sanchez.

The story begins, oddly enough, with chapters two and three on their debut, The Second Stage Turbine Blade (2002) and the follow-up, In Keeping Secrets of the Silent Earth: 3 (2003). The story goes that husband and wife Coheed and Cambria have passed a deadly virus to each of their four children. They are ordered to kill their children in order to save the universe from annihilation. However, one of the children escapes and so the story unfolds.

Good Apollo… is the third installment of the pentalogy, albeit Chapter 4 (the band’s fifth album will be Chapter 1, thus providing the listener with an origin of the events described on the previous albums). The album opens with the instrumental “Keeping the Blade”, an ominous

yet compelling orchestral meshing of the opening themes, “Second Stage Turbine Blade” and “The Ring In Return” from the previous two records. It is followed by the warm acoustic, dropped-D drones of “Always and Never”. One of the true standout tracks and the showcase of the entire disc, is the impressive “Welcome Home”. It’s here that you get a taste of Coheed and Cambria’s appetite for classic rock. The opening classical guitar riff gives way to a distorted bombast of riffage that totally blind-sides the listener with a sound that harkens back to Screaming for Vengeance- period Judas Priest. The symphonic verse cadence is reminiscent of Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir”, and here one can

understand the vocal comparison’s with Rush’s Geddy Lee, as Sanchez shrieks and wails within the vein of Lee’s trademark high-pitched pipes. The tracks that follow, “Ten Speed (Of God’s Blood and Burial)”, “Crossing the Frame” and “Apollo 1: The Writing Writer” are stellar rockers that should appease their diehard emo following who lament the band’s movement towards a more pervasive progressive/classic rock sound. The album rounds out with “The Willing Well”, a four-part epic with each of its sections clocking in at seven minutes plus. While it’s a bit tedious at first, these sections grow on the listener, thus demonstrating the band’s hallmark qualities of tight musicianship, pleasing harmonies and enough tasty guitar interplay to satisfy the most hardcore metal fan.

The exceptional thing about Good Apollo... is that one does not have to follow the story line to enjoy the music. The music is noteworthy on its own merit without the need to be privy to the scenario. The release of Good Apollo... firmly establishes Coheed & Cambria as force to be reckoned with in the prog-rock genre. With each successive record, the band pushes the envelope a bit little further, spreads it wings a little bit wider…ready to take off and leave scores of derivative emo bands in its turbulent wake.